There are two simple reasons why you don't like beer, if you don't like it: 1. You've never had a really good one; and/or 2. You eat too much refined sugar. Address these problems and you will be well on your way to developing a sophisticated "beer palate". As a delightful bonus, you may even find that the body this palate feeds becomes leaner, lighter, and more metabolically stable-- a better adapted running machine!
Your whole life, since childhood, has been a process of learning to appreciate things that at first seemed difficult or off-putting. If you're like me, going for a run by yourself was one of those things. But your earliest and most frequent challenges in the gauntlet between childhood and adult maturity probably concerned what you ate and drank. At one point in your life, you probably thought a steady diet of Lucky Charms sounded like a dream come true. Then it was Kraft Dinner. But now you salivate at the thought of a good curry. And, like millions of North Americans (mostly over the age of 40), there was a time when you thought all coffee tasted the same-- or perhaps even that Dunkin Donut's or Tim Horton's coffee was better than specialty coffee, because the latter was "too strong". You likely can't recall how it happened, but somehow your palate began to discern subtleties of flavour underneath the off-putting taste-exterior of things you thought you didn't think. The interplay of different spices in good Mexican or India food slowly appeared beneath the heat, and a medley of flavour notes began to announce itself beneath the bitter presentation of that third specialty coffee you were peer-pressured into buying by your cooler college friend.
Unfortunately for you, this never happened with beer. Why?
First, because "Big Beer"-- whose global ownership concentration makes the oil and gas industry look like a free market paradise-- has been exceedingly good at doing what it does: Marketing its bland swill to you in every nook and cranny, and making it look as though its products don't all come from the same place. So you've tried "beer" in several of the seemingly vast varieties you've seen advertised and marketed, and you didn't like any of them. And, since, as the advertisements told you, beer, like all alcoholic beverages, was mainly for getting drunk on, you decided you preferred something different-- probably something more concentrated, or something sweeter. And even if you stuck with "beer" for your binging purposes, you had to admit that you don't really like the way it tastes. In any case, beer doesn't interest you, and the possibilities of beer as a pure flavour experience have not occurred to you. You might even be thinking: "Why bother making an effort to like something I've tried and have no interest in, just because a couple of bearded guys at the end of the bar told me I don't know what I'm missing"? "My world of taste is complete, thank you very much", you might be thinking. You might even be thinking: "And beer will make me fat" (of which more below).
But second, chances are you don't like beer, even if you've been lucky enough to had access to a really good one (courtesy of that bearded guy at the end of the bar), because you still eat too damned much refined sugar! That's right, you can't actually taste a really hoppy, roasty, sour, or grassy brew because the amount of refined sugar you eat has prevented you from registering this range of more bitter, resinous, and grainy flavours. Your palate has been conditioned to expect a certain (and likely pretty extreme) amount of simple sweetness in everything you eat. As a result, anything as bitter and grainy and, say, an IPA will hit you with assaultive force.
In the end, our taste in food and beverage is the classic "matter of taste". But, if you're a serious runner-- and especially if you're a serious runner-- I'm here to tell you that you're lack of taste for beer in objectively wrong. Lucky for you, I'm also here to tell you how to acquire a "beer palate" and thus how to "get right with beer".
Step one is uncomplicated, but perhaps the most difficult for some: eliminate as much refined sugar from your diet as you possibly can. And remember that it is everywhere in the North American diet. Vegetarians and vegans will likely have a leg up in this department, but anyone can do it, especially anyone with the discipline to run long distances every day.
Step two (a month or so into step one), start sampling different styles of craft beer to find one that matches your current taste in other food and beverages. If you're a daily coffee drinker, this will be relatively easy. You will cotton onto a well crafted stout or porter almost instantly. Look for something relatively full-bodied and with a higher ABV (e.g. a barrel-aged imperial stout, perhaps with an adjunct like coffee, chocolate, or fruit). If you like fruit juices, kombucha, cider, or even soda pop, try a sour ale (a old and formerly defunct style currently exploding in popularity) with a fruit adjunct. If you're neither a coffee nor a light, fruity beverage consumer, you might connect with an IPA, the flagship style of the craft beer revolution. But keep the degree of difficulty on the low side for your first few attempts. A lower ABV, single IPA will likely taste sufficiently bitter and hoppy for your initiation period of 6-12 weeks.
If you are American, you will have little difficulty in tracking down good brews to sample. Simply consult beeradvocate.com or ask a beer-loving friend for help (we are always willing-- nay, too willing-- to offer suggestions). If you are Canadian, things are a little trickier. Some provinces, like BC and Quebec, whose retailing scene if far less regulated, offer rich and diverse beer landscapes. Many of the others are veritable beer deserts. Residents of these places will have to seek out beer-o-philes where they can find them, and work with their provincial retailers to order in product.
Finally, what can you expect if you manage to complete this two step process? If you're like me and thousands of other runners who like good beer, you may find that your appetite for refined sugar disappears in direct proportion to you ability to appreciate the complexities of different beer styles. You may also find that your drinking style (if you were a drinker before) begins to change. For the same reason you would never consider choking down as much of your favourite food as you possibly can, to the point of nausea, you will be reluctant to binge on beer. Your newfound respect for beer as an artisanal product with more to offer than simple oblivion (to say nothing of the extra cost of good beer) will give you serious pause before over-consuming. You will also, as I explained in the flagship post above, begin to crave beer as food, not as beverage, which will mean that you will appreciate it best soon after running, and in smaller quantities. All of this could end up being a boon to your running. In acquiring your "beer palate" you will have traded the useless calories in refined sugar for the complexly flavourful calories of hops, malt, and yeast, often with a net reduction and a positive effect on your insulin sensitivity (meaning a leveling of appetite and more stable blood sugar). Your appreciation for beer may well also change your relationship with alcohol in general, in the form of a less impulsive and more "adult" drinking style-- meaning, perhaps, no more runs or workouts impaired by compromised sleep and/or poisonous hangovers. Thus to the motto: "Drink less to enjoy more" we can reasonably add "and run better"!*
*Again, complete abstinence is a perfectly reasonable choice for runners, for the same reason that its a reasonable choice for anyone. But my aim in this space is to celebrate beer as beer, not beer as alcohol vector, albeit also without denying the essential role of alcohol in beer.
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